“You should be careful, Madonna Sancha,” I said finally. “I’ve known five girls in this city who died bound down. Their arms wide, their legs spread, and their throats cut.”

“Just whores,” Sancha shrugged. “Nothing to do with me. Another died like that two nights ago.”

My voice came out too sharp. “You’re sure?”

“Staked to a table with knives. Juan told me. He heard it from a guard. What does it matter?” Sancha hesitated a moment, and I wondered if she’d made the same connection I had, but she just looked impatient that we weren’t talking about her any longer. You may be a king’s daughter, lovely lady, I thought, but you really aren’t very bright, are you?

“You know, Juan’s been very attentive to me,” she went prattling blithely on. “If Cesare thinks he can keep me waiting, well, he’ll find I can have as many Borgias as I like without pining after him—”

I twined my hand through her hair again, and she broke off her complaining to dandle her hand down toward my breeches. She had a gleam of spite in her half-closed eyes that I’d seen before too, on girls who thought it great fun to wait till a man was half clothed and then snap their legs closed with a stream of spiteful laughter. A dangerous trick to pull on a full-sized man who might use his fists, but what can a dwarf do except slink away in shame?

“Why don’t you tell me more,” I murmured, dropping a string of unhurried kisses down her slender neck as she stroked me. I like being teased no more than any man, but I’d let her do it if it kept her talking. “Tell me everything you know about this woman who died two nights ago. And after that, tell me all about Cardinal Borgia and his . . . tastes.”

“Is that the kind of thing you like to hear?” She laughed. “You’re a twisted little man, aren’t you?”

“Oh, you have no idea.” I was smiling as her mouth closed on mine, but not because I had a princess in my arms. Another girl was dead, and that was nothing to smile about . . . but perhaps I’d been right after all. Perhaps the man in the mask wasn’t a product of my imagination.

And perhaps I had not been so wrong to suspect Cesare Borgia.

Giulia

There’s no sight like a girl being alluring with all her heart. The flutter of the lashes, the delicate blush of the cheeks, the rapid rise and fall of the bosom—it’s a performance in its own right, just as much an art as the singing of a motet or the execution of a complicated basse-danse. Having made quite a study of allurement myself, I enjoyed watching another woman do it well.